Point of Weakness
by Supernoodle
Summary: Alec is always okay - isn't he? That is until his first encounter with Manticore's friendly neighbourhood seizure disorder. Sick!Alec, Worried!Joshua, all good. My first Dark Angel fic. Slightly edited version posted October 2011.


_**Right then. This is a slightly edited version of a story that I posted back in March 2008. There were a few niggling things that annoyed me every time I re-read this so I have decided to do something about it.**_

_**This is my one and only Dark Angel fic - I don't love Alec with quite the same passion as I do Dean Winchester, but he still inspired me to write this story. So be gentle, let me know what you think, and I hope you like it. **_

_**Enjoy! X**_

_**Supernoodle,**_

_**7**__**th**__** October 2011**_

* * *

**Point of Weakness**

**-o-**

Alec peered pensively up at the dark sky and cursed under his breath, clutching his arms around himself. It had been raining for days and wasn't showing any signs of stopping, and the icy rain had already soaked through his clothes, soaking him to the skin. But it wasn't just cold that was making the big X5's body shiver so violently.

It had started early that day – a muffled ringing in his ears, his usually perfect vision blurring around the edges so that it was like staring down a long tunnel. His thoughts becoming disturbingly foggy, everything taking much longer to process than usual. But the worst thing was the feeling of losing control, his body not moving like it always did, his limbs feeling like they didn't really belong to him anymore. Alec was always in control. He had to be.

X5-494 had been bred, born, and raised to be a super-soldier. An assassin. A weapon. Alec, like all the other X5s, was highly skilled in combat, recon, infiltration, escape and evasion. He could handle any weapon with barely a thought, could hack any computer system, he knew how to wire any explosive and thanks to his heightened reflexes, could drive any vehicle like a pro.

All X5 children had been trained to hold their breath for four minutes and Alec could hold his for much longer. He healed far quicker than regular folk, had a higher tolerance to toxins. A higher tolerance to pain. In addition to his advanced physical attributes, Alec possessed genius level intelligence – although Max would often beg to differ. He could also speak many languages, master things in minutes that would take most people weeks to pick up, and could read and assess people to the point of being empathic – which although handy in a covert situation, hadn't always turned out to be a plus point.

All in all, Alec was superior - and he knew it.

His body was a perfect weapon – or so he thought. Manticore had designed him to be the enemy's worst nightmare all wrapped up in a pretty package of transgenic genes. A deadly mix of beauty and the beast rolled up into one almost faultless specimen. The X5s were truly a wonder – the culmination of years of research and failed experiments. Manticore had never produced anything better than their X5s.

It was years later that their faults came to the surface.

Two things the scientists had not expected, two grave miscalculations. The first was the X5's excessive free will – a mistake they had realised far too late after the escape of Max's unit, and they had taken great pains to make sure they didn't replicate in any successive generations of transgenic. The second were the seizures.

Max had lost many of her "siblings" to Manticore's friendly neighbourhood seizure disorder. Some had died from them as babies, a few more in their teens before the scientists finally figured out what was wrong with their seemingly perfect creations, realising that the X5 brain chemistry was seriously out of whack. As a result, Manticore had begun supplementing their diets with tryptophan.

Max's unit had feared the dreaded shakes above all things.

X5-494 however, had not been a part of Max's unit.

Alec had never had a seizure in his life.

Alec's phone rang in his pocket and he pulled it out with hands that trembled so badly that he was barely able to push the answer button. He knew it would be Max before he even heard her voice. For someone who professed to hating his guts on a regular basis, she couldn't seem to leave him alone for two minutes.

But then that was Max all over – sticking her nose in to other people's business. The girl practically lived for it

"What do you w-want?" he snapped through chattering teeth, pressing the phone tightly to his ear for fear of dropping it.

"Joshua wanted me to call you. He's worried… What are you doing running out like that?" Then as if she was being prompted, she added an "Are you okay?"

Alec laughed, wincing at just how bitter it sounded even to him. Joshua, a genetic dog-boy freak - seemingly the only person in the world who cared if he lived or died. Just how had everything become so screwed up?

"You know m-me, Maxie. I'm always okay."

He heard her sigh and he was about to hang up when she spoke again. "I know what's wrong with you, Alec."

Of course, she knew what was wrong – the great Max knew everything. She always knew best. How many transgenics were dead because Max knew best?

"There's n-nothing wrong." He snapped in reply but he wasn't sure that was entirely true. His whole body felt wired, muscles twitching and crampy, heart beating hard against his chest like the worst case of anxiety he'd ever had.

Something was wrong but he'd be damned if he was going to give her the satisfaction of knowing it. Although storming out of Josh's like a sulky teenager without his jacket in the middle of the worst storm of the year was probably a bit of a giveaway.

He'd just had to get of there, had to get away from her, from Logan, and their smug, knowing glances. Everyone watching him when he'd stumbled and dropped the plate of burnt offerings that Joshua seemed to think passed as dinner party cuisine. The way his hands had been shaking… And Max studying him, sizing him up, looking for a point of weakness like he was a mark, just like they had been trained to. She couldn't help it, he guessed, anymore than Josh could help being what he was, but still, he couldn't deal with her of all people looking at him like that.

"Go home and take your pills, Alec." She told him down the line. "It's only going to get worse if you don't."

"Leave me the hell alone!" Alec snapped in reply, and hanging up the phone, he stuffed back into the pocket of his jeans. _Pills?_ What was the girl talking about? Did she think he was high or something? No matter what he did or didn't do, she was never going to give him a break.

Wiping rain off his face with his sleeve, Alec swallowed dryly as sudden dizziness swept through him and he clung to the brick wall beside him in a white knuckled effort to stay on his feet.

"Screw this", he huffed out, closing his eyes for a moment and dragging a couple of steadying breaths into his tight lungs he forced himself to keep moving.

Sleep, he just needed to get back to his apartment and get some sleep and then everything would be okay.

**-o-**

"Is Alec sick?" Joshua whined as Max hung up the phone. Seeing the glassy look in his friend's eyes had scared him – Alec had smelled different too. Most of the time he smelled faintly cat-like, Max too, but his scent had been strange tonight – and Joshua hadn't been able to figure it out. "Something is wrong with Alec."

Max nodded. "Nothing that a glass of milk won't fix, Josh." Then she turned back to Logan and Cindy who were still in their seats at the table, and smiled brightly. "So who's up for charades?"

Logan frowned. "Max… If Alec's in trouble, you should really go help him."

"Yes, help Alec." Joshua agreed, getting to his feet and peering at the storm out the window. "It's cold out – Raining! Alec not well."

"He'll be fine. I'm sure he'll just go home, take some tryptophan, and sleep it off. He'll live."

Logan's frown deepened; sometimes he couldn't quite believe how heartless Max seemed to be when it came to Alec. Okay, so the guy could be a selfish, cocky bastard sometimes, and he seemed to thrive on bugging the hell out of Max, but despite his better judgement, Logan though that deep-down Alec was pretty okay, and tonight he'd definitely not been himself. He thought that Max might have noticed how _off_ Alec had seemed and cut him some slack, but he'd been wrong. Then something occurred to him.

"Max, how do you know Alec has ever had a seizure before? I mean, he's been at Manticore his whole life. They must have kept him supplemented?"

She shook her head. "No, even with Manticore's supplements we still all had them; it's special bonus prize that all us X5s got free with our feline DNA."

"But Max…" Logan continued. "Alec isn't from the same unit as you, is he? He's a clone. Maybe when they made him they rejigged everything a little bit? Maybe his DNA is slightly different to yours? He's never mentioned seizures before, and I've never seen him take any pills... Have you ever even bothered to ask the guy about it?"

Max frowned and looked from Logan to Cindy to Joshua. All wore the same expectant expression. "Come on – this is Alec we're talking about. Mr _I'm always okay_! He'll be fine."

Logan shrugged and peered out the window at the storm. It was really hammering down now – not a good night to be walking the streets alone, sick or hurting. "I've seen how bad you can get, Max. Do you really want Alec to go through that on his own out there tonight? He looked pretty bad."

"But it's raining!" She pouted.

"Boo… You go out and get that boy, make sure he's okay. He'd do the same for you and you know it!" Cindy told her.

"Fine!" Max sighed and grabbed her coat from the sofa. "But if Alec isn't sick, I'm going to kill him!"

**-o-**

By the time he reached his apartment Alec could barely see straight, could barely hold the key steady enough to get it into the lock, and when he eventually got the door open, he almost fell through the doorway. _What the hell was going on?_ He'd never been sick in his life. Sure, he'd been injured before, and the shit they did to him at Manticore – well, that hadn't exactly been a party either. But sick? He didn't think X5s got sick – what with the amped up immune system and all the other little bags of tricks they had mixed into his DNA. Getting sick just wasn't something that was meant to happen.

Stumbling into the bathroom, Alec struggled weakly with his wet clothes, and by the time he managed to get stripped down to his boxers, he was ready to drop. Grabbing a towel, he wrapped it tightly around himself and sank down onto the lip of the tub, hunching over as he tried trying to stop his teeth from chattering.

Okay, he was cold – but not cold enough to be shivering this badly. Something was definitely going on, something bad.

Taking a deep breath, he forced himself back up to his feet. In the cracked mirror above the sink, he caught sight of his reflection and almost didn't recognise the haggard face staring back at him. He was white as a sheet, black shadows under heavy lids, his pupils huge, making his green eyes appear almost black.

"Looking good, man." He murmured to himself, wrapping the towel around his shoulders as another wave of shakiness swept through his muscles leaving him feeling weak and dizzy and he shuffled into the living room, easing himself down onto the shabby old sofa.

Sleep. If he could get some sleep he was sure he'd be fine, but there was a niggling little voice in the back of his brain telling him otherwise as he curled up on the seat, and God, it just wouldn't shut the hell up.

**-o-**

"I looked round Sector Five but he's not there." Max yelled down the phone to Logan. She had been to all of his haunts but no one had seen the big X5 – there was only one place to look now.

"Have you been to his apartment yet?" Logan's voice asked down the line.

Max sighed and looked at her watch. It had been dark for getting on an hour now. They were meant to be having a pleasant evening at Joshua's place tonight, drinks, nibbles, polite conversation and now she was out in a storm looking for a guy she didn't even really like. "I'm headed there now."

"Good." Logan replied. "Because Joshua left for there about fifteen minutes ago."

"Logan, why did you let him out? You know it's not safe for him to be running around on his own." She said wearily. Trying to keep the anger out of her voice, none of this was Logan's fault and it wasn't fair to take her annoyance out on him.

"Hey…" Logan replied. "I don't have super strength – no way I was going to be able stop the guy."

Great, she thought to herself. If Alec was really in trouble, she was going to have a 250lb panic-stricken overgrown puppy to deal with as well. And she cursed Alec for the millionth time that night as she headed to his apartment.

**-o-**

"Alec? Alec sick?" A distant voice called. Latching onto it, he slowly pulled himself back to consciousness - finally opening his eyes to see Joshua sitting on the floor by the sofa, pawing his hair and whining softly. At least he thought it was Joshua, his vision was kind of… kaleidoscopic.

"Hey big guy." The X5 replied, voice hoarse and breathy. It hurt to speak, hurt to breathe – in fact, everything was hurting, muscles twitching painfully, head pounding. He just wanted to curl up in a ball and slip back into the cold darkness.

"No, Alec should stay awake and talk to Joshua. Alec shaking when he was asleep. Not good for you to shake like that. Shaking like Max shakes sometimes."

Alec tried to follow what Joshua was saying – shaking like Max? When did Max ever get sick? Was this part of some new Manticore surprise that he didn't know about? "I'm okay Josh." He murmured, closing his eyes again and he barely even felt it when Joshua scooped him up off the sofa and carried him into his bedroom.

Laying Alec gently on the bed, Joshua pulled the covers over his shaking body, burying him under a pile of blankets, and sat back on the floor by the doorway, keeping watch and whimpering as the X5's own body painfully betrayed him.

**-o-**

"Alec? Are you in there?" Max yelled as she hammered on the door to his apartment. There was no answer and she was debating whether to kick the door in or not when suddenly it opened and Joshua's massive frame greeted her.

"Hey Max." The transgenic said quietly. "Glad to see you. Alec still sick." Grabbing her arm, he pulled her into the apartment and led her to the bedroom, where Alec was laying balled up on his bed, buried under the pile of covers.

Max frowned and knelt down next to the big X5, pulling the blankets away from his face – she had to admit he didn't look good. She could see the tremors tearing through his limbs and his face was creased in pain.

"He's been shaking like you shake sometime, Max." Joshua told her as he knelt down beside her.

Max nodded. So it was the seizures after all. And maybe Logan was right? – maybe Alec had never had them before? He had never mentioned them to her, not even in passing conversation, and boy, did Alec like to talk. Plus she had never seen him trying to score any tryptophan from any of her suppliers, and she would have noticed that. Reaching inside her jacket she brought out her own little bottle of pills – she had twenty, maybe twenty-five left – enough to spare a few for a fellow soldier, but even if she could get them into Alec in the state he was in, they were going to take a while to kick in and from the way he was trembling it looked like he was building up for a big one.

"Hey Josh – can you look in the fridge and see if Alec has any milk."

"Sure thing, Max." The transgenic replied and loped off towards the kitchen, coming back a moment later with a carton in his hand. "Why you want milk, Max?" he asked her, handing her the carton. "You thirsty?"

She shook her head, took the carton from Joshua's hand, and put it on the table beside the bed. "It's for Alec, we need to get him to drink it and take some of these pills."

Joshua frowned. "Milk will make Alec feel better?"

"Yep." Max replied nodding. And she shook Alec's shoulder gently, feeling his body thrumming beneath her hand. Heat was pouring off his skin and she wiped his face gently with the corner of the sheet, pulling some of the blankets off him. They all burned bright, their bodies naturally revved up, running faster and hotter than regular humans, but still…

"Alec!" She called gently, shaking his arm. She had been so angry with him earlier for running out on them like that, for being his usual selfish self, but now, seeing him in such a state, she softened. She had been there herself and knew it was no joke. The seizures made her feel weak, helpless – vulnerable. All things that X5's were not supposed to feel. Plus the big ones hurt like hell.

The X5's eyes remained tightly closed, quick breath struggling though clenched teeth. She said his name again, louder this time, but still Alec didn't respond. Joshua was now standing behind her as she sat on the edge of the bed, whimpering softly like a puppy left out in the rain.

"On your feet, 494!" she yelled loudly and Alec's eyes flickered open, glassy and unfocused, but he knew she was there.

"M-Max?" He struggled out, as a more powerful convulsion snaked through his body, making him cry out in pain. "Just l-leave m-me alone…" He whispered to her and tried to bury himself back under the covers, hiding his face in his pillow. "I'm sick."

"I know." Max replied gently, taking hold of his hand, trying not to wince when he gripped it back hard enough to break an ordinary's fingers. "When Manticore made us, they screwed us up, Alec. You might think the X5s were the crème de la crème, but really, we were a botched job. There's something in our brains that goes screwy, a lack of serotonin – those scientist weren't as clever as they thought they were."

Alec frowned, trying to follow what she was saying to him. "M-Manticore made a m-mistake? You're k-kidding…"

Max smiled and nodded. "I know. Big surprise, huh?"

"So what's wrong with me?" He asked gritting his teeth against a moan of pain as another wave of involuntary contractions ripped though his muscles.

"Seizures…" She replied. "My unit all had them – _Ben_ had them."

"Ben?" Alec asked, frowning. "493?... B-But I've never… Dammit, M-Max. _This hurts_!"

Joshua knelt down next to the bed, looking from Max's face to Alec's and he patted his head gently. "Please Max, make him better?"

Alec cracked open his eyes again and glared at her. "If you know all a-about this, tell me you c-can stop it!" None of this would have been happening if he were still at Manticore. A lot of stuff wouldn't be happening now if they were all still at Manticore. Sometimes he hated her for what she had done… Everything was so messed up now. He was so messed up, and now even his own body was betraying him.

"Max." He gasped breathlessly, crying out in pain. It felt like his muscles were tearing away from his bones. "P-Please - This is _killing_ me!"

Max shook out half a dozen pills from her tryptophan stash and she tried to open Alec's mouth and get him to swallow them, but his teeth were locked tightly together and she didn't think she was going to get them down his throat without him choking. Frowning, she looked over at Joshua, thinking what she should do.

"Hey Josh, can you sit him up - hold him still?"

Joshua nodded and scooted up onto the bed, lifting Alec up into his arms, holding the big X5 tightly as the increasingly violent seizures tore through him – his green eyes now mere slits, peering vacantly up at the ceiling, then rolling back into his head when the next tremors hit.

Max got to her feet and ran to the kitchen. Grabbing a glass from of on the cupboards, she jogged back to Alec's side and bit open half a dozen of the tryptophan capsules, pouring the powder into the bottom of the glass. Topping that with the milk, she stirred it quickly with her finger and climbed up on the bed next to Joshua.

"Alec?" She yelled, shaking him and slapping his cheek none too lightly, trying to bring him round a little, but he remained unresponsive. "Alec, wake up now. I need you to drink this!"

"Max?..." Joshua whined and she looked into the transgenic's eyes, giving him a silent apology. She should have seen this coming; she should never have let Alec get in this state. He was far from her favourite person, but he didn't deserve this. None of them deserved this. Grabbing his jaw, she forced her fingers in between his teeth, opening his mouth as much as she could, then slowly she poured the tryptophan laced milk between his lips, holding her hand over his mouth as he coughed and choked, but managing to get most of it down his throat. When she was satisfied she was going to get as much of the milk into him as she could, she and Joshua laid him gently back down into the bed.

"Will he be alright now, Max?" Joshua asked her as she got to her feet. He was still holding onto Alec's arm, not wanting to break contact… Not wanting to let him go.

She nodded. "He'll be fine, Josh. You know Alec, he's always fine."

**-o-**

It was a couple of hours before Alec opened his eyes again. Logan had driven over to the apartment after Max called and told them what was going on and it was Logan sitting by his bedside keeping watch when he finally came back to the land of the living.

Cold green eyes opened before recognition clouded them and Logan stood away from the bed, just in case, knowing what the X5 was capable of.

"Alec?" He called out as the transgenic pushed himself free of the blankets and pulled himself to a sitting position, panting and gasping in pain. Taking a step towards the bed, Logan reached out to touch Alec's arm and the X5 looked up at him, hostile eyes flashing a warning in the dim light.

"Don't. Touch. Me."

Logan quickly pulled his hand away and stepped back again, knowing better than to mess with an X5 in full-on defence mode. "Sure thing Alec – Sorry, Man… Just wanted to see if you were still with us?"

Alec closed his eyes, puffing out a heavy breath and Logan could see his knuckles were white as he bunched his fists into the sheets below. Although the seizures seemed to have run their course for now, the big X5 still seemed to be in a bad way.

Taking a tentative step forwards again, Logan eased himself down gently on the very edge of Alec's bed. The transgenic was still trembling and he had never seen the guy's face so pale. Blood crusted the edge of his cracked lips from where he'd bitten them during the throes of the seizures, his eyes were bruised looking, blackened from burst blood vessels and his face still bore the marks of Max's fingers from her fight to get the tryptophan into him.

"How're you doing?" Logan asked him cautiously.

Alec took a deep, shuddering breath. His wounded, bloodshot eyes meeting Logan's, and the earlier enmity was gone. "I'm okay…" He ground out through gritted teeth, then couldn't help but choke out a bitter little laugh. That answer seemed to be hardwired into his brain. "_Son-of-a-bitch!_ I feel like I've been hit by a truck, man. Everything hurts…" And as if to reiterate the point, Alec's nose suddenly began to bleed.

Logan grimaced and gestured towards the trickle of thick dark blood. "Uh, Alec… You're kind of bleeding."

Alec put a hand to his face, frowning at seeing his fingers coming away sticky and red and he sighed heavily. "Oh… That's just _great!"_

Looking up at Logan once more he gave him a small hesitant smile. "Dude, you think you could get me some tissue or something?"

"Yeah sure thing, man." Logan replied, getting to his feet. "I need to get you to drink some more milk too. Max's orders."

"Max?" Alec replied distantly, he was still studying the blood on his fingers, as if it had the answers to what had happened to him. As if it was going to explain why he deserved this. "Did she leave?"

"She had to." Logan called out from the other room as he searched the tiny kitchen for something to mop up blood with, eventually finding a wad of paper towels in a drawer by the sink. "She had a job to do for me."

"Oh…" Alec's voice replied from the bedroom. "Something important?"

Logan walked back into Alec's room, handed a couple of the paper towels to the X5, and put the rest on the bedside table. "She's out doing some recon. Bad guy. You know – the usual."

"Right." Alec replied, trying to clean the blood of his lip. His nose was still bleeding and it kind of worried him to think what damage his body had done to itself. "Is Joshua still here?"

Logan nodded. He's asleep on the sofa, I was just going to wake him up. I kinda have to go too, if you're okay?"

Alec looked up and nodded. "Yeah… I'm fine, I think. Max said I'll be fine, _right?"_

"Yeah, she did. You just need to drink as much milk as you can and she's left you some more tryptophan pills. Just take a few of them if you start to feel shaky again."

Alec looked forlornly at the supplies on the table next to the towels. "Milk and pills – Got it!"

"Okay then." Logan replied clapping his hands together and glancing at his watch. He felt sort of mean leaving Alec alone after what he'd been through, but then, he wasn't alone – Joshua would take care of him and he really did have things he needed to be getting on with.

"Well. Look after yourself Alec." Logan told the X5, slapping him gently on the shoulder. "Call us if you need anything, okay."

"Okay." Alec replied through gritted teeth. Every muscle in his body felt torn to shreds, crampy, weak. He bit his lip, trying to breath through the overwhelming emotions that were threatening to spill tears and heard the front door shut as Logan left.

"I'm okay…" He huffed out, covering his eyes with his hand for a moment, and when he looked up again, Joshua was standing in the doorway to his bedroom.

Joshua, a genetic dogboy freak – his only friend in the whole world and the only person who even seemed cared if he lived or died.

Just how had _he_ become so screwed up?

"You okay?" Joshua asked gently, coming to sit on the bed next to him.

Alec shook his head and try as he might, he couldn't stop the tears that escaped down his cheek. His hands were shaking again, his whole body still trembled, but it wasn't the seizures this time.

"No Josh…" He replied quietly. "I'm not okay."


End file.
